Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Coming Home ❯ 50 ( Chapter 50 )

50

 

And something somewhere that you said goes ricochet

All through my head

 

::Brad, I need to talk with you.:: I shut the door behind us with shaking hands, the paper bag dangling from my fist. The folded top of it was clammy with my sweat.

 

Farfarello had quite calmly escorted me back to the hotel, and up to our room, and now moved to sit beside the air conditioner vents, running his fingers through the cold forced air. Nagi watched him for a moment, then turned fearful eyes toward me.

 

Aloud I said, “Got the goods. He added some weird cobra stuff and gave me some teabags, guess they believe in lagniappe around here.” I hurried into the bathroom to get a couple of glasses of water. All of a sudden, I felt dry and parched and frantically in need of something normal to do.

 

“Thank you,” Brad called softly. “We'll go with this standard dose for a couple of days, see how it works. Nagi tells me the condition can improve in a week's time or so. We'll start with that.” ::Schuldig, what's wrong?::

 

::Farf.:: I replayed the weird conversation we'd had, letting Crawford hear the quiet conviction in our teammate's thoughts when he'd told me “and now I see.” ::We had a run-in with an unlucky kid on a bike, don't worry, Farf didn't hurt him. But we got a little bruised up. Farf got knocked upside a tree, and cut his head a little.::

 

::Ah, hell.::

 

::Where do you think he's going with this, Brad?:: I asked as I handed him his water and the first of the warfarin tablets. I made a mental note of the time, then dug a pen out of the nightstand and scribbled the time on the paper bag, being careful to specify it was afternoon and not the middle of the night. One per day, same time every day; can't afford to fuck that up.

 

Brad sighed as he brought the little innocent-looking pill to his lips. He seemed to be steeling himself, or praying, before placing the tablet in his mouth and washing it down. “So now we wait,” he murmured, sounding the smallest bit unsteady. ::Head wound, Japanese…I think if that Kritiker agent survived the fight, he might be in a great deal of danger.::

 

If Farf was going into an obsession, there was no telling when it would flash over into full-blown violence, and without his intended target, he could strike out at anyone, even his own teammates. ::Shit. So what do we do with him, Brad? With you down, I can't just knock him out and haul him around. I'll need him.::

 

::I'm sorry, Schuldig, but you're going to have to deal with this one. I don't at the moment foresee anything of interest, but you know it doesn't always work clearly where Schwarz is concerned. You're all too close to me.::

 

I got up and paced around the bed. My hand still trembled as I raised my glass, only to find it already drained. I wandered back into the bathroom to refill it.

 

Nagi followed me. ::Schuldig, what's wrong with Farf? He's staring at the air conditioner.::

 

::I know, chibi. He had a…revelation.::

 

Nagi's mind flashed a series of frightened curses, then steadied again. He took a deep breath and nodded. ::It was only a matter of time, wasn't it? So what do we do?::

 

::First off, I'm not leaving him alone out there with Crawford. Come on.:: I led us out of the bathroom.

 

Brad lay back on the bed, one arm draped across his eyes. I hoped he was napping and not just waiting for the next crisis. Across the room, Farf had leaned down and was breathing across the cooling coils in the air conditioner, making tiny plumes of fog as moisture hit supercooled air. My skin crawled from mingled dread and cold: he looked like some kind of dragon, mist rising from his snout as he waited with all the patience of the universe.

 

Again Nagi looked up at me, his eyes wide and haunted. ::Schu, I'm getting very frightened. What if Brad's sight never comes back? And what if Farf forgets who you are again? I can't use my powers, not reliably. I won't be able to protect us from him.::

 

Memories welled up in me, memories of disasters barely averted, and I had to clamp down on it before telling Nagi something he didn't want to recognize. Whether he was well or not, Nagi had never been able to protect himself from Farfarello. ::Let me worry about that, okay? You're on medical duty, you worry about Brad. How's he doing? When would he have any reactions to this shit, if he's going to?::

 

::Side effects tend to be mild, unless the dosage is way too high,:: Nagi told me, returning to his usual stoic calm when dealing with a medical crisis. ::Watch him for --::

 

“I know you're talking,” Farf muttered, his head turned so he peeked at us with his one good eye. “Are you talking about me?”

 

“We're talking about Crawford's medication,” I whispered, stepping closer to the Irishman and effectively putting myself between him and Nagi. “I thought he was sleeping, I didn't want to wake him. Do you want to be brought into the net, Far? It's not a private talk.” My head felt dizzy, and I realized I was damn near hyperventilating. I forced myself to calm down and offered my mad friend a neutral smile.

 

Far stared at me, nothing moving but his mouth as he spoke. “You're lying.”

 

“Not necessarily,” Brad stated, his voice strong and sure, “but he is mistaken. I'm not asleep.” He sat up and started to reach for his glasses, then frowned and let his hand drop to the pillow. “It's been what, fifteen minutes? Nagi, how long do we wait for any adverse signs?”

 

“Forty is protocol, Crawford. For most medicines, the really dangerous reactions come quickly.” Nagi took this opportunity to sit beside Crawford, putting as much distance between himself and Far as he could manage. “But as I was telling Schuldig, warfarin doesn't tend to be too bad in the normal dosage range. We'll just have to watch you for bleeding, or any stomach problems.” The boy colored a little and added, “Since you won't be able to see it, and you probably wouldn't feel it, that means someone will have to make sure you're not passing blood in the toilet.”

 

Brad put a hand on Nagi's shoulder and nodded. “Understood. If you prefer, Nagi, tell Schuldig what to look out for. I never intended for you to have to deal with anything so, well, personal.”

 

“I'm your medic, Crawford,” Nagi told him, scowling a little. “I won't shirk my duties. But you'll have to tell me if there's any pain, or dizziness. And if you get any hint of sight back, let me know at once. We can adjust the dosage if it doesn't work in the first week, but if it doesn't work in two… I might be on the wrong track with this. I'm sorry, it was the closest I could find.”

 

“Don't worry about it,” Crawford said. “I'm betting on this being the right way to go, and I'll let you know if and when that changes, all right?”

 

While they talked, I watched Farfarello. He'd returned his attention to the mechanical wind, and again breathed clouds into the stream of it. I hated to admit it, but he was becoming our weak link. If we couldn't get him stabilized, he'd be more of a danger to us than Esset.

 

Esset. Farfarello had slain the highest of the Elders himself, driving his poniard into the man's heart. A blood sacrifice to a forgotten god? In any case, the killing had overwhelmed Far's mind, driving him to become as his code name: Berserker.

 

He had gone after the clawed assassin, singled him out and grappled with him before the youth could react. Far wasn't looking for combat, he was doling out slaughter. I'd caught a glimpse of Far smashing the other's head against the wall, hard enough to crack the finish. From what I'd seen on the beach, that wasn't all he'd cracked.

 

His head wounded to death, and his deadly wound was healed. Book of Revelations. I'd heard it often enough before, I probably had as much memorized as Far had. No, that's an exaggeration, but still I knew more of it than I liked. There would come a many-headed beast; wasn't this supposed to be the Antichrist, the herald of the end of the world? Fuck, so maybe I didn't know that much about it, but I knew where Far was going with the Japanese thing, and so did Brad. It couldn't be good.

 

But if Farfarello hated God, what did he intend to do with the supposed Antichrist? Invite him out for coffee?

 

“Schuldig?”

 

I blinked and looked around. Shit, I'd lost myself for a minute. Again. “Yes?”

 

“We need to come up with a plan,” Brad stated. “I can't get too far ahead, or the precogs searching for us will get wind of it. But we need to think of something. We can't stay here.”

 

The reality of the situation hit me: Farfarello, overtly mad and probably dangerous; Nagi, basically non-combatant; and Brad Crawford, blind. And me, Schuldig, showing stress cracks that scared the hell out of me. We couldn't fight like this. We couldn't run far, either.

 

Then I remembered something Nagi had said, something Crawford had told him, in fact, and it all came together.

 

“We have to go to Kritiker,” I said. “There is no other choice.”